Ten photos mainly
taken by Betty Nolan are posted at www.kodakgallery.com
in an album entitled “Ireland
– 2010” under the account of Lewis “Buzz” Nolan’s email address. Email lewis_nolan@yahoo.com for instructions
on how to access.

By LEWIS NOLAN

May 8, 2010 –Saturday
- Retracing Slea
Head Drive and Mulcahy
Pottery

Because of our travel clock’s battery evidently failing,
Betty and I slept in until 8 a.m. at the very comfortable suite we enjoyed at
the Dingle Skellig Hotel.

With the sun already up and bright, we were greeted by a
beautiful Irish morning of blue skies, lots of sunshine and rather cool
temperatures at this late Spring time of year.

We again had our usual, excellent and included breakfast at
the hotel’s Coast Guard restaurant with its big tables of cold and hot morning
foods. The very nice restaurant manager, Paula Monyan,
gave us a cheery and smiling greeting, which we’ve come to expect from hotel
employees per the posted signs formally making “promises to guests” that are
faithfully observed.

I had my usual breakfast of two poached eggs, several pieces
of Irish bacon, a small banana, a few slices of fresh fruit and two dried
prunes, along with a slice or two of buttered, Irish brown bread and a small
glass of tomato juice. Once again, I’m ready for the activities of the day.

Well fed and with wonderful weather at hand, we decided to
spend at least part of the day again retracing the scenic Slea Head Road
drive. We had taken the route earlier in the week and had been mightily
impressed by the beauty of coastal scenes at their very best. Persons in the
area that are interested can obtain detailed information from various tourism
brochure locations.

We planned to follow the Slea Head Road
on the recommended route, going out Dingle around the bay to the minor highway
to Ventry along the coastline. We had breathtaking
views of farmland and coastal sights, re-affirming (again) the loving artistry
and Hand of the Creator at work millennia ago. Cliffs were steep and the Atlantic was deep blue with a white fringe of surf.

Here and there were a few sandy beaches that would invite
sunbathers on the rare days when the temperature warmed to 80 degrees F or so
in this part of Ireland.
We did see a few surfers clad in black wet suits to ward off the bone-biting
chill of the ocean – reported to be 62 degrees F.

In the distance was the rugged farmland in various shades of
green and criss-crossed by ancient stone walls.

At one especially pretty headland washed with crashing surf,
we trekked down a paved, narrow road that winded its way down to a small but
pretty beach. A nearby sign said it was where scenes from the highly regarded,
dramatic movie of a half-century ago, “Ryan’s Daughter,” were filmed in black
and white.

Our only disappointment came when we stopped at the
government-developed and managed BlasketIslandsCenter, a historical
tribute to the old native lifestyle on the islands that disappeared in the
1950s. That is when the remaining few dozen inhabitants were forced off the
remaining Great Blasket Island because of the
difficulty of providing medical care and other services across the sometimes
very rough water between it and the mainland.

I had remembered eating fairly well at a reasonable price in
the museum’s cafeteria on a previous trip. However, neither the fare nor
charges were reasonable on this visit. My large green salad was piled high with
sliced onions and a half-can of corn kernels. It was basically inedible.
Betty’s selection wasn’t much better. Making it worse, a male employee refused
to place any ice in our soft drinks (saying “that’s what Americans like but we
don’t.”) So we didn’t eat our $30-lunch and agreed that we would not return to
the place.I think I should report our
unpleasant experience there to Irish tourism authorities.

Farther down the Slea Head Road, we stopped
(again) at ClogherBeach to take some more
photos at the gorgeous-but- little-visited overlook. It offers a truly
magnificent view of the ocean pounding away at the beautiful beach and its
cliffs, but signs warn that currents make it unsafe for swimming.

Leaving the beach area, we took several short detours down
narrow lanes to SmerwickHarbor.
One we had taken some years before to visit Wine Rock Point. Near the waterline
was where area residents had parked several camper-trailers for probable
week-end use. Trusting people, indeed.

We got back on the Slea Head Road and turned off
onto another narrow road at the now-closed Smerwick
Hotel, where we had stayed some years ago when it operated as a smaller
facility under the Wine Rock Inn name. We had learned the former owner had
greatly overestimated the market for upscale lodging in the area. Just as it
was in the early 1990s, the best hotel on the DinglePeninsula
is far and away the four-star Dingle Skellig 15 or so
miles away, our lodging in 2002, 2003 and on this trip.

We re-visited the very historic Gallarus
Oratory a few miles away from the now-closed hotel. It is reputedly the oldest
Christian church that is still standing in Europe.
It looks something like an upturned, large fishing boat made of painstakingly
placed stones. It is perhaps 30 feet long and 15 feet wide, with stone walls
18-to-24 inches thick. It has a small window on one end and a narrow door that
a tall visitor would have to stoop over to pass through. I gather that even the
Irish were not as big 1,000 or more years ago as they are now.

The Oratory – an ancient name for a church – is thought to
have been built in the 7th or 8th Century A.D.A relatively modern supervisory office
collects a modest fee from visitors to walk inside the Oratory, buy souvenirs,
use restrooms or go upstairs to a snack bar.

We enjoyed talking to a native Irishman who runs the visitor
center, a man who seemed to be educated and well read in matters of Irish
history and public policy. His name was Seamus (pronounced Sha-muss
as in old-time cop movies) Kelliher. He was quite
knowledgeable about the English mistreatment of native Irish during the great
famines of the 1840s and 1850s; he took me outside and gave me the use of his
high-powered binoculars to examine a distant hillside on BrandonMountain
marked by a low, stone wall.

The wall had been built, he allowed, as a public works
project. It was part of the pitiful and pathetically inept attempt of the
ruling English to provide relief to the starving Irish. Ireland was a
19th Century basket case in all respects after the vital basic
potato crop failed. Its failure from blight resulted in extensive famine and
out-migration during the famine years. Seamus asserted the “totally useless
wall” was built by very hungry men with no means of support. They were paid
only a penny a day for their back-breaking labor despite having to walk some
miles to and from the worksite.

Seamus also pointed out a nearby, medieval-looking stone
fortress which had been built centuries before by the conquering Normans. The Irish had
been forced to work for them. Betty and I had poked around it on a previous
trip when the old fighting tower was being made ready for tours. However, the
tourist interest never materialized as it was closed to tour again a few years
ago.

It was fun talking to Seamus and an absolute delight to see
a man with his deep interests and knowledge about the subject under his stewardship.
Too many times, Betty and I seem to end up talking with dim-witted youths at
attractions interested only in whatever money they can get for being polite to
tourists. He gave us several interesting brochures dealing with interesting
historic structures in the area and also ancient manuscripts.

Despite his directions and assorted maps, we had a tough
time finding again the unmarked monument to the ancient Irish Celtic settlement
and church of Kilmalkedar.
But after stopping for directions when back in the vicinity later in the week,
we were told precisely its nearby location by an elderly Irish woman primping
her front yard. We visited the ancient Roman Catholic church made of stone –
but missing its roof. We saw a couple of workmen cutting grass in a very old
burial ground surrounded by old and modern graves. One stone about chest-high
has traces of the now-forgotten Ogham writing on it.

Once back at the Dingle Skellig
Hotel, I enjoyed a pint of Harp Lager beer and napped while Betty read for a while.

There was another blowout wedding reception at the hotel
that afternoon. Betty enjoyed watching the young marrieds
and their attendants from the rural area arrive in flower-bedecked cars and a
Rolls-Royce limo. Some of the festive clothing of the guests was “distinctive,’
to say the least.

Betty inquired of an Irishman wearing plaid shorts and
Scottish-looking accessories about when the wedding reception music would be
played by a visiting group with traditional folk instruments. With a big grin, he
said, “When they stop drinking.” Actually, we were told by a couple later that
the wedding reception carried on until the pre-dawn hours next morning. It’s no
wonder that it is sometimes difficult to check into Irish holiday
accommodations until mid-afternoon.

We again hugely enjoyed another wonderful dinner in the
hotel’s Coast Guard restaurant. I had freshly caught and broiled sea bass and
allowed myself a few French fries served with Betty’s dinner of Fish and Chips.
We split a very yummy crème brulee for dessert.